The technology described herein relates generally to gas turbine engines, and more particularly to mechanical connections in such engines incorporating a low-ductility material.
A typical gas turbine engine includes a turbomachinery core having a high pressure compressor, a combustor, and a high pressure turbine in serial flow relationship. The core is operable in a known manner to generate a primary gas flow. The high pressure turbine (also referred to as a gas generator turbine) includes one or more stages which extract energy from the primary gas flow. Each stage comprises a stationary turbine nozzle followed by a downstream rotor carrying turbine blades. These components operate in an extremely high temperature environment, and must be cooled by air flow to ensure adequate service life. Typically, the air used for cooling is extracted (bled) from the compressor. Bleed air usage negatively impacts specific fuel consumption (“SFC”) and should generally be minimized.
Metallic turbine structures can be replaced with materials having better high-temperature capabilities, such as ceramic matrix composites (“CMCs”). The density of CMCs is approximately one-third of that of conventional metallic superalloys used in the hot section of turbine engines, so by replacing the metallic alloy with CMC while maintaining the same airfoil geometry, the weight of the component decreases. By replacing a majority of the airfoils in a turbine nozzle, the total weight of the assembly decreases, as well as the need for cooling air flow.
CMC and similar materials have unique mechanical properties that must be considered during design and application of an article such as a shroud segment. For example, CMC materials have relatively low tensile ductility or low strain to failure when compared with metallic materials. Also, CMCs have a coefficient of thermal expansion (“CTE”) approximately one-third that of superalloys, which means that a rigid joint between the two different materials induces large strains and stresses with a change in temperature from the assembled condition. The allowable stress limits for CMCs are also lower than metal alloys which drives a need for simple and low stress design for CMC components.
Concurrently, components having flow-directing shapes (such as airfoils) should not be allowed to float independently of each other, which would negatively impact aerodynamic performance.
Accordingly, there is a need for an apparatus for mounting CMC and other low-ductility airfoils that minimizes mechanical loads on those components while providing a statically determinant anchor point.